Despite the book's sub-title, there are there are actually not 50 but 108 poems in this anthology, "Sailing in the Mist of Time". Of course, not all 108 are major award-winners. Some earned a "Commended" certificate and some were short-listed. But even a short-listed poem has a great deal to offer. Meryl Raw's entry, "Aftermath", speaks with seemingly effortless imagery directly to the heart of the reader: "I am a puppet/Suspended on commanding strings/Spiritlessly dancing/On command/Performing empty acts/Hanging on hope's hooks."

Picturesquely imaginative imagery is often a feature of award-winning poems. In Tim Napier's commended entry, "Consolations", the poet can "hear the pine boards whisper/To the piano over there,/In the corner; they're going/To have a little hymn sing, Sunday, at 6/And my dead great aunt/Is going to play. The pony/Floats up out of the rug by the bed/Where I slept as a child, comes/Whinnying down the back hallway/To see me. She wants me/To play horse. Shadows/from the larch trees planted/At three corners of the cottage/And cut down long/Ago, wash across the floor..."

In many such entries, the images are cleverly sustained for a large number of stanzas. Sometimes, however, a poem is well served by brevity. Jeff Howe's highly commended "Horses in the Mist" is most effectively confined to two stanzas, each of six lines. The opening stanza: "When just before the day breaks free,/Rips loose the ragged reign of night./Clouds descend to hug the land,/Obscure the image from my sight/Of pastures where the grass is kissed/With dew, graze horses in the mist." These images are astutely reworked in the final stanza to bring the poem to a most effective close.

So, imaginative imagery, cleverly sustained and brought to a powerful closure are often qualities found in award-winning poetry. Every poem in this book, whether it won a First, Second or Third Prize or a High Distinction or was Highly Commended, Commended or Short-Listed, appeals to the reader's mind, plays on his or her emotions, and presents not only something of beauty and insight, but, being poetry, sings to the soul.